A selection of quotations about social change, resistance, politics, and a wide range of other topics. Quotations are arranged in alphabetical order by the first letter of the first word. There is a page for each letter. You are welcome to use and share these graphics. If you want to copy a quote banner, right-click on the image and select 'Save Image As'.

Acts of resistance and solidarity are often so small that unless you look closely you may never see them.
- Michael Riordon

Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim:
The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.
- Bertrand Russell

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
- Jesus of Nazareth (Matthew 19:21)

All governments lie.
- I.F. Stone

All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts.
A British Tory will defend self-determination in Europe and oppose it in India with no feeling of inconsistency.
Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them,
and there is almost no kind of outrage – torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations,
imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians – which does not change its moral colour
when it is committed by ‘our’ side . . . The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side,
but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.
- George Orwell

All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system,
there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless,
that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.
- Noam Chomsky

Almost anything you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.
- Mohandas Gandhi

The amassing of unfettered wealth of individuals and corporations should stop. The inheritance of rich people’s wealth by their children should stop. The expropriators should have their wealth expropriated and redistributed.
- Arundhati Roy

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
- Arundhati Roy

Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media.
- Noam Chomsky

Any idiot can face a crisis – it’s day to day living that wears you out.
- Anton Chekhov

Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up,
and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better.
- Abraham Lincoln

Anybody interested in solving, rather than profiting from, the problems of food production
and distribution will see that in the long run the safest food supply is a local food supply,
not a supply that is dependent on a global economy. Nations and regions within nations must be left free
– and should be encouraged – to develop the local food economies that best suit local needs and local conditions.
- Wendell Berry

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.
- Leonardo da Vinci

“Anyone who has explored the world of archives will know that it is a treasure house,
one that is full of surprises, crossing paths, dead ends, painful reminders and unanswered questions.”
- Nelson Mandela

Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.
- Albert Einstein

Apologists for censorship invariably profess noble motives. They tell us that of course they are in favour of freedom of speech ‘in principle’ – then they go on to explain that ‘the greater good’ requires denying freedom of speech to people whose views they dislike.
- Ulli Diemer

As a rule I don’t believe in poverty and suffering as a way of learning anything,
but in my case the hardship and starvation of my inept queer life have usefully simplified my notions of what a good society is.
As with any other addict who cannot get an easy fix, they have kept me in close touch with material hunger.
So I cannot take the Gross National Product very seriously, nor status and credentials,
nor grandiose technological solutions, nor ideological politics, including ideological liberation movements.
For a starving person, the world has got to come across in kind. It doesn’t.
I have learned to have very modest goals for society and myself: things like clean air, green grass,
children with bright eyes, not being pushed around, useful work that suits one’s abilities, plain tasty food, and occasional satisfying nookie.
- Paul Goodman

As far as American business is concerned, Nicaragua could disappear and nobody would notice.
The same is true of El Salvador. But both have been subjected to murderous assaults by the US,
at a cost of hundreds of thousands of lives and many billions of dollars. There’s a reason for that.
The weaker and poorer a country is, the more dangerous it is as an example.
If a tiny poor country like Grenada can succeed in bringing about a better life for its people,
some other place that has more resources will ask, ‘why not us?’
- Noam Chomsky

As for the future, most of those who talk and write about it do so as if it already existed
and as if we were being inexorably carried toward it, like passengers on a train moving toward
a place they had not seen and could only wonder about. This is of course not true.
The future does not exist. It has not been made. It is made only as we make it.
The question we should be asking ourselves is what sort of future do we want?
- John Holt

At the time I was arrested I had no idea it would turn into this. It was just a day like any other day. The only thing that made it significant was that the masses of the people joined in.
- Rosa Parks